By Dean Weingarten
Arizona – -(Ammoland.com)- According to wikipeida, Chief Lanier was born on July 22, 1967. That makes her a few weeks over 49 years old today. She is retiring as of September 16th, when she will be almost 49 years and two months old. From wtop.com:
When retiring D.C. police chief Cathy Lanier takes her new job as head of security for the NFL, she’ll be tackling one of pro football’s ongoing problems — domestic violence.
After almost 10 years as chief, and 26 years with the Metropolitan Police Department, Lanier’s final day will be Sept. 16, and within days she will assume her new role as Senior Vice President of Security, overseeing all aspects of security for professional football.
Police Chiefs have relatively little to say about police policy on political issues. They do what they are told, and are usually selected as much for their political alignment as for their efficacy as police leaders. Lanier’s antipathy toward the Second Amendment is squarely in line with the District of Columbia City government. She leaves office with at least two ongoing lawsuits against her for enforcing the city’s unconstitutional gun policies. From the washingtonpost.com:
On the national stage, Lanier became a voice for gun-control laws, complaining that crime in the District and other cities was driven up by repeat violent offenders with easy access to weapons.
While she headed the department, possessing and privately using small amounts of marijuana became legal, the courts time and again forced the city to rewrite rules for gun ownership, turning the District into a battleground for Second Amendment cases and overturning the city’s long-standing firearms ban that upended one of the centerpieces of the chief’s crime-fighting strategy.
Chief Lanier will be handpicking her interim successor, so it is unlikely that the anti-Second Amendment policies will change from within.
Chief Lanier is expected to have retirement compensation from the City, financed primarily by U.S. taxpayers, of about $165,000 to $190,000 a year. Espn.com puts the figure at $177,000:
Lanier made $253,000 annually as police chief. Because her departure is considered a retirement, she will receive an annual pension of roughly $177,000. She declined to disclose what her salary with the NFL will be.
To Chief Lanier’s credit, when a court ordered a stop to the enforcement of laws banning the carry of guns in the city, she obeyed the court.
One of the latest lawsuits naming Chief Lanier as a defendant is about whether police can require a “good cause” as necessary to obtain a permit to carry a firearm. From uslawshield.com:
The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia by three private citizens, Brian Wrenn and Joshua Akery, both of Washington, D.C., and Tyler Whidby, a Florida resident who also maintains a residence in Virginia, and the Second Amendment Foundation. The city and Police Chief Cathy Lanier are named as defendants.
The lawsuit asserts that “individuals cannot be required to prove a ‘good reason’ or ‘other proper reason’ for the exercise of fundamental constitutional rights, including the right to keep and bear arms.” All three individual plaintiffs in the case have applied for District carry permits and have been turned down by Lanier because they could not “Demonstrate a good reason to fear injury to person or property.”
In our view, the city’s requirements to obtain a carry permit are so restrictive that virtually all applicants could be — or will be — turned down. At the time of this writing, only eight permits have been allowed, so it’s plain to see that very few situations will sufficient for Chief Lanier to issue a permit.
I doubt if the lawsuits had anything to do with Chief Lanier’s decision to leave D.C. Lawsuits have become one of the burdens of being in high position in the United States. It would be nice if Chief Lanier gains education about Second Amendment rights in her new position, but it seems unlikely.
©2016 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice is included.
About Dean Weingarten;
Dean Weingarten has been a peace officer, a military officer, was on the University of Wisconsin Pistol Team for four years, and was first certified to teach firearms safety in 1973. He taught the Arizona concealed carry course for fifteen years until the goal of constitutional carry was attained. He has degrees in meteorology and mining engineering, and recently retired from the Department of Defense after a 30 year career in Army Research, Development, Testing, and Evaluation.